


Of Women and Chipped Cups

by EstelleDusk



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: F/M, Fluff and Angst, Golden Heart, Multi, Rumbelle - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-24
Updated: 2013-04-24
Packaged: 2017-12-09 08:25:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,908
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/772125
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EstelleDusk/pseuds/EstelleDusk
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After Milah, there were two women in Rumplestiltskin's life. With both women, something broke.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Of Women and Chipped Cups

**Author's Note:**

> So in case you guys actually have read these stories on Tumblr before reading them here, I'm just gonna make it clear to you that I've been copying my drabbles over from there to here ever since I realized that the tag I normally use for my drabbles on Tumblr seems to be utterly broken. Also, the exact date this was written...was the day 2x16 aired, The Miller's Daughter.

When he stole the power of sight from the Seer, Rumplestiltskin saw two women. One, he saw himself kissing 3 or 4 times when she was in a cream gown. The second, he saw working as a maid in a castle that he seemed to have made himself quite at him inside. They both had brown hair. They were both beautiful. More than that, they also never appeared in his visions again until they had come into his life.

For the first 2 and a half centuries, he could never figure out why two such drastically different women would appear to him once, and then never again. He assumed that the woman in the cream gown fell in love with him and that they would live a happy life together while he waited for this Regina to be born and to cast the Dark Curse he spent so much time perfecting. He also assumed that the maid would come with the Dark Castle once he found and “bought” it. 250 years went by with him thinking this.

Finally, he saw the Regina girl again, and this time, he also saw the woman in the cream gown. Although, the mystery woman was giving birth to Regina, inside a castle and surrounded by midwives, himself nowhere to be seen as was custom. He began to hesitate about his Dark Curse; he had seen how it would be cast.

Regina would use her father’s heart in a dark ritual to cast the spell that would take all of the land to a world without magic. After a week of thinking about it, he decided to risk it, knowing the future could change and also knowing he hadn’t even written that part into the spell yet. He was certain he could find a way around that little part. So he went looking for the mystery woman, slowly putting together pieces from his visions to discover her.

And so he did, in a kingdom whose prince’s name was Henry. He just happened to be skulking by when a Princess Eva tripped a miller’s daughter. He had snickered about it before she proudly raised her head and said her name to Prince Henry’s father. He saw her face then as she was forced to kneel and apologize, lest she lose her livelihood.

Cora.

He grimaced, wondering why her name couldn’t at least sound as beautiful as her face seemed. It sounded like something breaking, and upon hearing the name, his sight even provided the visual of a chipped cup. He began to hope that his future self didn’t fall for her simply because of her beauty. He didn’t believe himself that desperate for companionship. Thus he began to believe that his vision of kissing Cora, was simply him manipulating her.

When he visited Cora in the tower after the masque ball, with a long contract neatly written and demanding her first-born in exchange for his services, he didn’t expect her addition. At her cheek, he began to see something in her that would cause him to try and love her. He gave her his name and began to teach her his favorite trick.

Turning straw into gold.

From that point, until he met with Cora under a tree on the eve of the wedding, everything seemed to happen in an instant. He taught her to spin gold. She fell in love with him. And he liked to think, he did the same. He could tell that he cared for her at the very least. He taught her to rip out the hearts of others and control them. They kissed the way he saw in that first vision.

What he didn’t count on, was how easily she could throw her love for him away. Her power meant more to her than him. And he couldn’t believe it. She tricked him out of his price. When he left her beneath the tree, all he wanted to do was rip out her heart and repeat what he did to Milah, to Cora.

But she had already beat him to it. It didn’t help that he then saw a vision of her standing above, his dagger in hand, and him on the verge of death. He returned to his castle, pacing as he tried to think of a way to make himself feel even better. Suddenly, he tripped over an upturned corner of the rug and, remembering the image of a chipped cup, knew exactly what he would do. The first thing he did was lit the rug on fire.

Next, he threw his porcelain tea set. A few chairs. He grabbed hold of a cupboard and pulled it down. He went threw the entire drawing room and tore it to pieces. Once the contents of the room had been destroyed by force or flame, he moved through the other rooms, doing the same. He had quite a few tea sets, and he felt the best as he smashed them.

He made a mental note to keep the fragile tea sets in stock, relishing the sound of cracked porcelain on the cold stone floor. He also made a note that he should try and find that maid girl. He had a feeling he would be breaking many more things as the years went on. It was quite the calming past time and he didn’t want to have to always clean up afterwards. Another note he made, was as a part of his Dark Curse. He made sure to specify that the only way Regina would cast their world into a land without magic, was if she sacrificed the heart of the person she loved most. As the years went on, he had a hand in ensuring that the only person Regina loved more than herself, was her father. Rumplestiltskin admitted to himself that it was an act of petty revenge on Cora that moved his hand to write those words.

He was disappointed when he finally found the maid. It wasn’t long before Regina was supposed to put his long overdue plans into motion. But when he saw how the aptly named beauty would come to reside with him, he only tallied a an hour or two instead of his usual few days.

As he played up his insanity gambit and demanded the girl as his price for the safety of their village from the ogres, he thanked the gods that her name was easy on the tongue.

Belle.

And what a beauty she was, he thought. Her pride made him grin. Her demand that she choose her own life made him wonder why the gods would grace him with such a person as a maid. He believed that he had finally earned a break, and that that was the reason she would come with him now. And who was he to look a gift horse in the mouth?

As he led her from her ruined castle and into his own Dark Castle, he thanked the gods he used to pray so fervently to, and swore that he would make the best of his gift… after a few days of breaking her into her new life.

Belle was born and raised a noblewoman after all, she wouldn’t be used to the hard labor she would have to do from now on. He had her stay a night in the dungeon without food or water, just to make her place in his castle clear. During the night, he researched spells that would ensure she lasted until the Curse was cast.

In the morning, before he woke her to begin work, he cast a spell on most of the objects in his home. The spell, would ensure that she need only work half as hard as a normal scullery maid until her constitution allowed for harder labor. The dishes would wash themselves of the toughest stains. The rags would keep the floor clean when she wasn’t paying attention. The laundry would need only the gentlest touch to keep clean.

And he made sure that a tea set would always be set up in the mornings by the stove, only needing her to add the water. When he let her out of the dungeon, he said she could start the day by making the tea and then bringing it to the drawing room. She nodded silently before rushing away to do as he asked, finding the kitchen thanks to his quick tour the night before, which ended with her “bedroom.”

He made himself comfortable, quips on his lips as she entered the room. He started by telling her how to address him, and to always confirm that she heard what he said with a word or two. When he joked that her duties included skinning children, she dropped the porcelain cup she had nervously been bringing to him.

For a moment, he was reminded of Cora, and to get her off his mind, he focused on assuring Belle that it was just a cup. From that day on, he drank his tea every morning, afternoon, and evening in that chipped cup. His new maid relaxed him with her lively presence and soon found himself forgetting about Cora. His plans were in place, all he needed to do was wait. And the more time he spent in the presence of Belle, the more glad he was that he specified in his curse that all of his possessions would be waiting for him in the new world.

Belle has slowly become one of his prized possessions. And where before, he would drink from the chipped cup to annoy her, his reason became that he wanted to acknowledge her. She was his maid, so despite how well they began to get along, they had to keep their relationship in check. He suspected that she realized he liked teasing her and meant no harm by any of it. But she never brought it up, and he never thought he should tell her. He wasn’t looking for love after all.

Ever since Cora, all he cared about again was finding Baelfire. He was surprised when she seemed to truly want to know him, and he refused to be drawn in by her charms. So he sent her to town to fetch straw, letting her know that he suspected he would never see her again. But he didn’t relinquish his ownership of her, he thought it would be easier to live 28 years with her as his maid if she couldn’t remember a thing, including her budding feelings for him. His heart has been broken before, he wasn’t sure he could survive it happening again. And he knew it would happen if he allowed Belle to worm her way into his heart.

He didn’t realize his heart was already hers until she tried to kiss him again. He yelled at her, tried to make her hate him. He couldn’t believe she could actually love him, but he didn’t want to risk True Love’s Kiss being real. Though their stay in a world of magic grew shorter, he needed his power still.

It was the only way he would be able to find Baelfire, and protect him. His power meant more to him than Belle did, and he told her as such when he finally banished her from his home. He couldn’t allow her to break the curse that made him powerful, he couldn’t afford love. Not yet.

**Author's Note:**

> This work can also be found here: http://manipulativeinstincts.tumblr.com/post/45091960981/drabble-spoilers-for-the-millers-daughter-ouat


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